In general, high quality dielectric layers may be used in a semiconductor device, e.g. to control the field effect in a metal oxide semiconductor (MOS) channel. Further, high quality dielectric layers may be used in power semiconductor devices, e.g., for the control of high field strengths in a high-voltage edge termination. A silicon oxide layer may be grown on a silicon layer or on a silicon substrate by thermal oxidation, therefore, a high quality silicon oxide dielectric layer can be formed over a silicon layer or over a silicon wafer. Thermal oxidation processes may include, for example, furnace-growth or rapid thermal oxidation (RTO). However, thermal oxidation can only be used in the earliest stages of integrated circuit manufacturing. In general, various methods can be used to form a dielectric layer over a wafer or over another layer, wherein the chemical and physical properties, e.g. microstructure, chemical composition, homogeneity, surface roughness, electronic properties, band structure, electronic density of states (DOS), interface traps and fixed charges, etc., of the dielectric layer may reflect the manufacturing process. Further, also the physical properties of an integrated circuit, e.g. blocking voltage, operating voltage, leakage current, dielectric breakdown, current-voltage characteristics (so called I-V-curves), etc., may reflect the manufacturing process that was used for forming the respective structure elements of the integrated circuit.